Jamie Dimon did not anticipate that the general meeting of shareholders of JPMorgan Chase is held five days after his embarrassing revelation of a "trading error" of over $ 2 billion. In Tampa (Florida), on campus surrounded by palm trees of the "back office" of the largest bank in the United States, the boss of giant New York to its shareholders renewed the apology on last weekend. "This would never have happened … All corrective actions will be taken," Jamie Dimon promised.

Despite these exceptional circumstances, the meeting lasted only fifty minutes. And how the bank treats its customers in trouble with their mortgages will be raised as many questions as the famous trading losses. That some called him "the king of Wall Street" will still be held accountable in the coming weeks. The FBI has opened an investigation into the matter. While those directly responsible for "gross error" already thanks, Jamie Dimon did not give details to its shareholders on Paris failed to in London. One reason for this silence: the bank losing positions are unsettled. In disclosing details could make things worse by giving to other market participants with useful information to speculate against the positions accumulated by JPMorgan Chase.

A motion put forward by pension funds was to separate the CEO of the bank as president of the board. Designed before the fiasco last week announced it scored significantly from 40% of the votes. Jamie Dimon, however, will therefore continue to accumulate these functions fast payday loan no faxing. And the advisory vote on remuneration received 91.5% of the votes, far more than many other banks recently shaken by their shareholders.

Institutional shareholders, however, promise to analyze closely how the error is trading will be paid next year. They want some of their bonuses are retroactively removed. "It is possible that we do this," said Jamie Dimon to reporters at the end of the meeting.

Rising prices

In mid-session Tuesday for the first time since Friday, the course was part of JPMorgan Chase upward, reducing to less than $ 16 billion loss of capitalization of the bank since Friday. At nearly $ 139 billion, the market value of the institution still exceeds by more than 60% that of its rival Bank of America and Citigroup.

Barack Obama invited a female talk show on ABC, has implicitly recognized that this case does not affect the strength of JPMorgan Chase. "JPMorgan is one of the best managed banks. Jamie Dimon, his boss, is one of the most intelligent bankers that we have. And despite this, the bank loses $ 2 billion and losses continue to rise … We do not know all the details. The case will be investigated. But it shows why we voted the Wall Street reform … We could have had a bank that was not as strong, not as profitable, but that would have taken the same risks and we could be forced to intervene, "said estimated U.S. President.

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"From the grist regulators

In 2012, the autonomous communities must get their deficits below 1.5% of GDP. Regularly pinned by the rating agencies and international observers, the regions represent about 35% of public expenditure in Spain. In 2011, it is these governments that have caused much of the slippage in the government deficit of 6% of GDP in Brussels promised to 8.51% finally recognized. The Conservative government of Mariano Rajoy for stepping up the pressure as they bend to the rule of austerity.

First step, last Saturday: Rajoy has met 11 of the 17 regional presidents, those belonging to his training, the Popular Party (PP). Verdict: "I have seen an optimal response on the part of all the administrations involved, said the chief executive. Resigned, if you want, but in any case committed to implementing their new obligations. "In short, regions need to update their budgets to take account of national accounts. For transfers from central government will be limited. The second stage took place on Wednesday, with the call of the Minister of Health, Ana Mato, regional leaders. Health is, with education, the main item of expenditure of the autonomous communities. But Madrid has decided to trim 7 billion on the health budget.  

Retirees will pay more for their drugs

For weeks, regional presidents have launched trial balloons and explored new avenues for spending less: institution of user fees on consultations or on drugs, reducing the range of treatments offered for free or recentralization of health administration.

Today, Mato wants to push self-governments in the same direction. First announcement: retirees must pay for their drugs. So far, they were exempt, and now they shall pay 10% of the price indicated on the label, to a maximum of 18 euros per month. As for the assets, also will pay more business cards design. The bill would vary between 50 and 60% of the total price, depending on the tax form to every Spaniard. For now, all assets pay the same rate, 40% of the actual price. This new pricing should help save 3.7 billion euros.

The central government intends to finally exercise its watchdog role accounts. Before the end of the month, the autonomous communities must show in Madrid a "plan of financial imbalances" detailing the measures to restore the accounts. On Wednesday, Secretary of State for the Regions has threatened regions lax. "The Autonomous Communities may be subject to intervention if they are unable to meet their financial obligations," said Antonio Beteta. In other words, Madrid could take control in areas too spendthrift. A revolution in one of the most decentralized countries in Europe.

Banks: a peak of bad debts

Spanish banks are muddy in the economic crisis. In February, the rate of bad loans reached 8.2%. This is a record since 1994: the beginning of 1997, impaired loans did not exceed 1% of total loans. In one month, outstanding loans to businesses or people at risk of insolvency has increased by 3.8 billion to $ 144 billion. The austerity measures introduced by the Government to reduce the country's deficit partly explain this further deterioration. She falls ill while Madrid multiplies remediation plans to try to reassure international investors about the soundness of its banking sector.

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Announced the surge does not occur. With complete freedom of movement since 1 May 2011, workers from eight Eastern European countries have not crossed the German border en masse. To the chagrin of a country in need of labor.

Last spring, there was a lot of hope and concern. The bosses were rejoicing the arrival of a highly skilled labor force required, the unions were alarmed competition for low wage costs. Frank-Juergen Weise, head of the Federal Employment Agency, estimated at 140,000 the number of workers from the East who would cross the German border. A year later, in an interview with the Rheinische Zeitung, there were fewer than half, 61,000.

Since 1 May 2011, nationals of eight countries of the European Union (Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia) have the right to come and work freely in Germany and Austria. "It's a pendulum swing of history, Timo J. Bass, of the Institute on the labor market (IAB). We Germans, who need so much labor and skilled young, we shot in the foot. "

When Europe has expanded to twenty-seven members in 2004, Berlin, Vienna and Brussels had negotiated with a further period of seven years to fully open their labor markets payday loan. Meanwhile, workers from the East who want to improve their living conditions have already emigrated. Location: England, Ireland, Scandinavia and Switzerland, with more attractive salaries.

Wages less attractive

Germany, however, suffers from the image of a country with low wages and poor career prospects. "Employers also require a perfect knowledge of the German language," says Timo Bass. In the globalized market and highly competitive "Best Minds" Germany is a party with several lengths behind.

Today, the sketch of immigrants came from Eastern Germany is Poland (67%), works at a temp agency or in the building sector, in one of the richest regions of the country as Bavaria. Those who cross the border rather are those who do not find work at home. Therefore: competition weighs more on low wages.

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Boost growth at any cost. After a disappointing year in 2011 – the gross domestic product grew by 2.7% against 7.5% last year – Brasilia announces stimulus plan to support the industry and allow an increase in activity of 4 , 5% in 2012.

By injecting about 60 billion reais (25 billion euros), the President wants Rousseff repeat performance of its predecessor, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, 2008: Brazil to get between the drops of the global economic crisis. National investment bank BNDES sees the wheel of private loans increase by 45 billion reais (18.6 billion euros), 15 industry sectors will be exempt from social security contributions and the State agrees to purchase priority of goods produced in the territory.

Meanwhile, Dilma continues to operate the monetary lever, lowering the base interest rate, now 9.75% – 4.5% inflation counted once. The goal is to break the vicious circle that kept at a level astronomical, on behalf of the fight against inflation, making financial investments more profitable than productive investment. Due to the low wages offered by European and American central banks, Brazil has become a magnet for capital. The massive influx of foreign currency caused an overvaluation of the real, local currency, draping business competitiveness and pushing up the debt service, at the expense of public investment.

Modernize infrastructure

Beyond the exchange rate, the "Brazil cost" is mainly caused by poor infrastructure cash advance loan. Lula and Dilma have realized by increasing the action of the State, through the Growth Acceleration Program (CAP), to improve the quality of roads, airports, bridges, and thus lower the costs of export. "But this is not enough: the investment rate is 20%, it would have to reach 25% if growth takes off," Roberto Messenberg tip, an economist at the National Institute of Economic Research (IPEA) .

If the response to stimulation of the supply train, Rousseff account on demand. In recent years, household consumption has increased faster than growth, thanks to better distribution of income, profit social policy and rising wages. Consequently, the credit showed an increase of 20% per year. To maintain this pace, the government has pushed the two leading public financial institutions, the Bank of Brazil and the Federal Economic Fund, to announce a drastic reduction of interest rates for consumers and small businesses. He hopes that private banks will follow, to capture those 50 million potential customers from the "new middle class" are qualified as having acceded to the poor consumer.

The main advantage of the government is public confidence. Despite slower growth, hiring continues, and the popularity of the president has set a new record in March, 77% of Brazilians plébiscitaient his way of governing the country.

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New twist in the saga Free Mobile, which runs the telecom sector since January. Orange has threatened Saturday to suspend the contract that binds him to Free Mobile. Such a decision will have serious consequences for clients of Free Mobile since this agreement, said roaming allows subscribers of the new operator to go through the Orange network where there would be no network available Free.

What has bitten Orange? For this contract, Stéphane Richard, CEO of Orange, was repeatedly congratulated for having signed the beard of SFR and Bouygues him should yield about 1.5 billion euros. Two reasons for this reaction. First, Orange is concerned about the various failures occurred on the network of Free Mobile recently and wants to protect its own customers. "Orange reaffirms that it can, and will not hesitate to suspend the contract if the roaming network incidents Free Mobile would affect the quality of service to Orange customers," said a door- word of Orange.

Second, Orange believes they have been challenged by the regulator. "Contrary to some claims to Orange failures occurred on the network of Free Mobile in recent days, the group accepts no responsibility for these failures," added the spokesman of Orange. Saturday, in an interview with Le Figaro, Jean-Ludovic Silicani, president of Telecom Regulatory Authority, stated that "both sides have underestimated both the number of subscribers and the amount of traffic through the Orange network. "

Questioned, Free does not wish to comment. Arrived with a crash in January on the market of mobile telephony, the operator led by Xavier Niel now has nearly 2.2 million subscribers.

Poker game

This estimate comes from its competitor Bouygues Telecom as to the presentation of its quarterly results, Free Mobile maintains the mystery of this figure strategically. In mid-February, Orange admitted to have lost 201,000 subscribers, SFR and Bouygues Telecom 200 000 134 000. The irruption of Free Mobile phone on the board, with very aggressive prices, the market has completely changed into the headquarters of groups (see below). Its competitors were forced to revise their prices downwards. Bouygues Telecom is the company to provide rate reductions of up to 40%.

Finally, in the incredible poker game that is played between players, the latest statements of Orange do they represent a real threat or a bluff? For how could the contract that would, they say, has been negotiated foot foot for forty-five days, did not foresee all situations, especially breakdowns? Besides his denunciation would have a significant cost to Orange.

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"There is no question that I invest in this action. There is no visibility. They mastered neither the personnel nor the cost of oil prices. They face strong competition from other companies, "said one portfolio manager bad credit payday advance. This opinion, indeed radical, summarizes the weariness of many managers who do not want to invest in Air France KLM.

The numbers speak for themselves. Market capitalization is more than 1.67 billion euros, less than 7% of annual sales and less than 25% of equity. The group is in any case weighed down by a net debt of 6 billion euros.

However, Louis Giscard d'Estaing is convinced that there is still food for thought in the financing of 35 hours. He will file an amendment in the bill funding the Social Security (PLFSS) for further reduce the limit on exemptions from employer contributions on wages at 1.5 times the minimum wage (currently against 1.6). Which would represent just over one billion euros in savings, if the measure comes into force on 1 January. He even suggested to lower the ceiling to 1.4 times the minimum wage in July 2012 to "give companies time to adjust."The UMP also suggests to "a general movement of the plane of the allocations to the operators of the state" by reducing them to 3% in 2012 payday advance lenders.

"Do not replace two staff on three"

In this area, Hervé Mariton (UMP, Drôme) also proposes to "ease the regulations that impact cost." Other proposals of the Liberal "not to replace two of three officials" and "examining investments less profitable," particularly in the area of ​​infrastructure. "Do not panic about short-term savings. We will be judged on the strength and seriousness of a savings plan in the long term, "said Mariton. Special Rapporteur of the mission work jobs, Chantal Brunel (UMP, Seine-et-Marne) will propose to leave the tax deduction on home jobs "all leisure activities and relaxation."Isabelle Vasseur (UMP, Aisne), Rapporteur of the Finance Committee on Social Security Financing Bill, will propose this afternoon the establishment of "prevention, source of major savings in health" she assures.

The former chairman of the Senate Finance Committee Jean Arthuis think we need to "reduce the amount of grants to local authorities" and "to lower executive compensation operators of the state." Former budget minister, Dominique Bussereau is more cautious: "We are still on the bone. The revision of public policies (RGPP) was very effective, so that the state is under-Box at the local level, "says he.

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Already, Valérie Pécresse asked the Directorate General for Modernization of the State to work on five priorities:

1 – Developing for priority services, personalized assistance to users during the process online (telephone, email, chat).

2 – Offer the user evaluation surveys on the Internet or mobile at the end of any administrative process.One way to take into account the voice of users and improve services according to their reactions.

3 – 5 Launch pilot projects on social media in the areas most relevant to the user: health, human services, education, employment and culture.

4 – Offer a mobile application offering users a personalized list of deadlines and the status of its efforts.

5 – Allow the user to present to the administration's vouchers via their mobile phone with a flash code (income tax, electricity bill and telecom).

While this report confirms the strategy implemented by the government in 2010, Valerie Pécresse welcomed the tangible results already achieved.

* 160 public websites have been consolidated or eliminated to improve the readability of the presence of the state line.End of 2011, the volume of websites of the state has been reduced by 50%. For greater efficiency.

* 2.5 million users have opened an account on the site mon.service-public.fr steps online.

* 76% of administrative procedures expected by most users have been dematerialized.

* The mobile phone version of the portal administration is now available (m.servicepublic.fr).

Nearly $ 200 billion of securities

The FHFA criticizes all of these institutions have sold financial products backed by mortgages on the two parastatals of mortgages Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, between 2005 and 2008. At the time, the banks had facilitated access to loans of U.S. households to recruit new customers and sell homes often too expensive betting on rising prices.The system had finally collapsed during the summer of 2008, taking with it Fanny Mae and Freddie Mac.

The FHFA estimate that the seventeen banks have concealed certain characteristics of the securities they sold, including lying about reality checks on the creditworthiness of borrowers households. "The complaints allege violations of federal law governing financial assets and rights (common law) in the sale of securities backed by residential mortgages designed by these institutions," said the FHFA.

All the losses by the two organizations, which then 40% of the outstanding loans granted to the United States is estimated at 30 billion.Placed under public guardianship, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have so far cost $ 170 billion to American taxpayers.

The FHFA was assessed for each of the banks in the dollar amount of securities sold to two giants of credit (see box). In total, nearly $ 200 billion of securities that were sold. Most involved, the JPMorgan U.S. (United States) would have sold itself for more than $ 33 billion of securities. Societe Generale for its part would have yielded $ 1.3 billion.

"Fannie and Freddie knew"

The complaint of the Federal Agency is expected to lead to negotiations and a financial agreement to avoid a trial. In all cases, the procedure could be very expensive institutions in question, particularly in the largest U.S. bank by assets, Bank of America.The group should in fact not only defend his own actions, not the worst according to the FHFA, but also the mortgage lender Countrywide and investment bank Merrill Lynch, bought in 2008 make quick cash. Last June, the U.S. bank said it had agreed to pay $ 8.5 billion to end the prosecution of several investors and intended to spend an additional provision of $ 5.5 billion to clear the situation with Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. The Wall Street Journal fell when it was the agreement to compensate the largest ever signed. The group also announced on the night of Friday to Saturday it plans to reduce its workforce by 10%, equivalent to the elimination of 30,000 positions.

The defensive line of Bank of America today is that Fannie and Freddie knew very well what they were doing."They said they understand the risks" and "now seek to hold other market operators to be responsible for their losses," the group said in a statement.

Regarding the French bank Societe Generale, no figures were given, but the injury is considered "important" by the Federal Housing Finance.

Amount of securities sold by banks

1. JPMorgan (USA): more than $ 33 billion

2. Royal Bank of Scotland (UK): more than 30.4 billion

3. Countrywide (United States, Bank of America): about 26.6 billion

4. Merrill Lynch (United States, Bank of America): more than 24.9 billion

5. Deutsche Bank (Germany): more than 14.2 billion

6. Credit Suisse (Switzerland): over 14.1 billion

7. Goldman Sachs (USA): more than 11.1 billion

8.Morgan Stanley (USA): more than 10.6 billion

9. HSBC (UK): more than 6.2 billion

10. Ally (USA, formerly GMAC): over 6 billion

10. Bank of America (USA): over 6 billion

12. Barclays (UK): about 4.9 billion

13. Citigroup (USA): over 3.5 billion

14. Nomura (Japan): more than 2 billion

15. Societe Generale (France): nearly 1.3 billion

16. First Horizon (USA): 900 million

17. General Electric (USA, parent company of GE Capital): 550 million

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There is no evidence that the economic activity that turn red in the United States. At fifteen months of the presidential election, 71% of Americans disapprove of the economic policies of Barack Obama. This is a record. Only one quarter of those polled by Gallup favorably consider his efforts in employment and public debt. In this context, the President of the United States promised to present to Congress in September, a plan intended to reconcile two seemingly contradictory goals: on one hand, stimulate demand and employment, on the other hand, sustained reduction the budget deficit.

"When Congress will return in September, my message is basically this: we do not have to choose between the reordering of our business budget or growth and employment. We must do both, "said Barack Obama, touring the Midwest.Aware that his reelection is played on its ability to convince centrist voters he represents the best alternative to save America from a serious relapse into recession, coupled with a public debt crisis, the president is preparing for a tough battle this fall.

To boost employment, Obama is considering various measures: the creation of a bank investing in public infrastructure projects, tax cuts for companies that hire a reform of unemployment compensation to support the training expenses.Without the intervention of Congress, the Treasury may also review the program ineffective assistance households renegotiate the terms of their mortgages to avoid eviction from their homes.

Convinced of his sincerity

For their part, Republicans who dominate the House of Representatives, show no desire to abandon their opposition to any form of stimulus spending, even in the short term. "We must stop this talk of new stimulus spending with money we do not," continues Eric Cantor, Republican leader of the House, as a response to the White House.

The purpose of Barack Obama is not so contradictory as it sounds. It is even consistent with the recommendations of the International Monetary Fund (IMF).This is to agree on a credible plan for long-term budget savings, while accepting the very near future new spending intended to strengthen a fragile situation. To convince his sincerity in spending cuts in the long term, the president has put pressure on the bipartisan Select Committee of Congress responsible for identifying 1.5 trillion dollars in savings over ten years, by the end of November . He hopes that it offers twice the spending cuts in the long term.

This implies, firstly, that one key to health costs. Now Barack Obama is prepared to do so, despite the opposition of elected Democrats. On the other hand, it would generate new tax revenues.To achieve this, while Republicans block any tax increase, the President hoped that the Committee will opt for a comprehensive reform of the tax code, eliminating popular deductions in exchange for a lower tax brackets for individuals and companies. It is further necessary that Barack Obama ahead of detailed proposals in this regard. He has not dared to do so far.

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